How To Inherit Eternal Life

How To Inherit Eternal Life

In this article, our sermon will focus on inheritance of eternal life as written in Luke 10:25-37. It is a straightforward two requirements how to inherit eternal life – love God and neighbor, but somehow complicated process in the sense that it involves something that is not easy to accomplish. Our Lord Jesus Christ parable of the Good Samaritan doesn’t just answered the lawyers question about inheriting eternal life in these verses; it radically redefines what it means to love your neighbor. So it is necessary to take a look at the Bible passage that was written in the Book of Luke, and this is what it says:

25And behold, a certain lawyer stood up and tested Him, saying, "Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?" 26He said to him, "What is written in the law? What is your reading of it?" 27So he answered and said, ""You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your

strength, and with all your mind,' and "your neighbor as yourself."' 28And He said to him, "You have answered rightly; do this and you will live." 29But he, wanting to justify himself, said to Jesus, "And who is my neighbor?" 30Then Jesus answered and said: "A certain man went down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and fell among thieves, who stripped him of his clothing, wounded him, and departed, leaving him half dead. 31Now by chance a certain priest came down that road. And when he saw him, he passed by on the other side. 32Likewise a Levite, when he arrived at the place, came and looked, and passed by on the other side. 33But a certain Samaritan, as he journeyed, came where he was. And when he saw him, he had compassion. 34So he went to him and bandaged his wounds, pouring on oil and wine; and he set him on his own animal, brought him to an inn, and took care of him. 35On the next day, when he departed, he took out two denarii, gave them to the innkeeper, and said to him, "Take care of him; and whatever more you spend, when I come again, I will repay you.' 36So which of these three do you think was neighbor to him who fell among the thieves?" 37And he said, "He who showed mercy on him." Then Jesus said to him, "Go and do likewise."

This passage is explicitly affirming that the two requirements for eternal life is to love God and to love your neighbor. We will first discuss “love of God” the first requirement. Loving God is tantamount in placing your faith and trust to God’s only begotten Son Jesus Christ, Loving God is inseparable from loving and believing in His Son because Scripture clearly says in John 14:6, that no one comes to the Father (God the Father) except through Jesus Christ. Furthermore, it was confirmed in Romans 10:9-10, the passage goes like this: “That if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.” So from this verse, it was explicitly said that anyone who believes in our Lord Jesus Christ is made righteous, trusting that through Jesus sacrificial death on the cross, our sins are forgiven; and believing that by His resurrection, it will grant us salvation. But to complete the process, we must put it into action by confessing our faith in Jesus Christ as written in the passage, so as to guarantee our salvation as clearly stated in this verses; for it is by openly declaring your faith, and openly say you believe in Him telling others of your faith in Jesus what He did on the cross has given us, and what Jesus resurrection gave us, that is the only time our salvation is guaranteed. Without putting our faith in action, it is an incomplete process, salvation will not be granted, for it is an incomplete process.

Faith in Jesus is tantamount to the first requirement, “Love of God.” Faith in Jesus includes:

• Believing that Jesus Christ is God’s only begotten Son.

• If Jesus is God’s Son, we must believe that He has the power to forgive sins, because Christ died to save the world (John 3:16 and 1 John 2:2), trusting in Jesus death, our sins are forgiven

• If Jesus is God’s Son, He has the power to save us and give us eternal life through His resurrection

(Romans 4:25 and 1 Peter 3:21)

• If Jesus is God’s Son, we must accept Him as our Lord God and Personal Savior